Beautiful Disaster
by thelandslides
Summary: When they speak again, Adrian and Ben are already engaged to be married. Ricky/Adrian one-shot.


_**Author's Note: **_I don't know why, but this took me quite a while to write. In the midst of writing a really long Ricky and Adrian one-shot, I came up with the idea for this. I think it's really rushed especially towards the end and it probably seems like drabbles more than an actually story, but this is for all the Radrian fans out there, because I know there's still some. Don't like, don't read.

**Important: **This is somewhat Alternate Universe. Ricky and Adrian are twenty one, and it's been three years since Ben and Adrian's daughter was born. Ben and Adrian live together in a condo with their daughter, and the rest, you'll find out by reading.

Second, this is loosely based on the movie _Dear John. _If you've seen it, you'll recognize a certain line and several situations in this story. If you haven't, well, forget I said anything.

And third, enjoy!

* * *

**Beautiful Disaster**

When they speak again, Adrian and Ben are already engaged to be married. Ricky stands on her front porch trying to acquire the courage to ring the doorbell at some late hour when the moon's already out and he could barely see the sign marking the address of the condo complex someone gave him. He doesn't know why he's here, doesn't know why goosebumps are rising on his skin and he feels like there's a lump in his throat. His legs feel like jello and his heart is a drum rattling within his ribcage. He exhales unevenly and presses his pale knuckles to the wooden door and inches over to the doorbell, ringing it once.

As soon as he hears the buzzer echoing throughout the house he steps back, suddenly feeling repulsive for coming here. He feels like fleeing now before Adrian opens the door, or worse, before Ben opens the door to discover him standing here after two years of not seeing each other. After Ben graduated high school, he quit his job at the butcher shop, so therefore he's neither seen nor heard from Ricky since. And with the new kid, Ricky feels as if that's why he hasn't seen or heard from Adrian. She's moved on, he knows that. But he hasn't.

As he's turning on his heel feeling absurd and descending down the step, he hears the door creak open behind him. He slowly flips around and his lips part to speak, but no words come out. Adrian stands there, wearing black jeans and a deep blue blouse that shows her cleavage. There's no sight of Ben around her. And she's smiling, until it fades as if smiling at him is too much. "Ricky," she says. His name sounds foreign on her full, glossy lips, like she hasn't used it in so long, and he finds himself missing the sound coming from her mouth.

"Hey, Adrian." His voice sounds so small. He wonders if she can hear his heart pounding in his chest. "It's been a while."

"It has," she agrees, and he thinks something about her is different. She looks wiser, more sophisticated if that's possible, like she's been through a lot. Suddenly, he wants to know more about her life. "Do you want to come in? Ben's not here." She says it matter-of-factly, not secretively like it would matter one way or another if he came in.

"Okay, sure." He steps in her living room hesitantly, looks around for a moment. The volume of the television is low, playing _Friends_ – he remembers that she used to like that show – and the light is turned on in the adjoining kitchen. Adrian tells him she'll be right back and walks off into the kitchen, and Ricky watches her until he can't see her anymore.

Scanning his eyes around the room, he catches a glimpse of a photograph in a picture frame sitting on a table next to the china cabinet. His jaw tightens as he scrutinizes it: Adrian is holding a one year old baby with Ben's arm wrapped around her, both smiling. He tries to see something underlying in her expression there, but he finds nothing. He swallows the thick lump in his throat and looks away, until he notices Adrian coming back into the room. "Sorry," she says. He's taken aback for a minute, until he realizes she's simply apologizing for leaving the room.

She stands back a few feet from Ricky and looks at him for a minute. "Something about you is different, Ricky. I don't know what it is."

"I could say the same about you," he says immediately. "Where's—" He stops because it slips before he even thinks it through, realizes how unnatural the sound will be coming from him.

"Sarah? She's asleep in her room, down the hallway. I usually can't get her to go to bed this early, but..." Trailing off, Adrian goes over to the sofa, and Ricky expects that she wants him to follow her. He leaves a safe distance between the two of them, making sure there's one cushion between them. As they sit there, he feels slightly awkward and out of place, regretting that he ever came here.

Suddenly, Adrian turns her head and meets his eyes. Her raven brown hair falls down in wavy locks, just like it always has. "What are you doing here?"

He doesn't answer at first, just stares at her, letting his eyes trail down her body. "I don't know," he finally says, quietly.

"I mean, I haven't seen you in _what_? Over two years."

"I know. I probably shouldn't have come. I guess I just felt inclined to come see you."

She nods, still trying to figure out what's so different about him. Her lips curve into a familiar smirk. "Well, I'm not having sex with you."

Surprised, he smirks back, but it doesn't meet his eyes. "I know. That was a long time ago."

"Yeah," she chews on that for a minute, then clears her throat. "So have you settled down yet, or are you and Amy still together?"

"Nope," he says for an answer to both. "Amy and I broke up a while ago. We just didn't work."

"_Mmm_," she mumbles, suddenly flash-backing to the night in her kitchen several years ago when Ricky told her, "_Maybe I won't even like Amy._" "Sorry to hear that."

He nods, wondering if she means it. "I see that you're...getting married." He tilts his head toward the ring on her fourth finger.

She listlessly looks down at the ring and nods her head slowly. "I guess."

"You guess?"

"Yep. I mean, nothing's set in stone yet. Ben got this ring from his step-mother a few years ago. It's worth a lot and I can't believe he gave it to me." The whole time she's looking at her ring, Ricky's grimacing. "He says he needs to give me a proper engagement ring, but I can't see how he could possibly get a better ring."

"Yeah, it's _nice,_" he forces out, realizing that his voice sounds somewhat bitter. The only thing he processes in his mind now is her '_I guess.'_

...

Later that night, they stand in the kitchen together making sure to keep their voices down so they won't wake Sarah. Adrian cooks dinner and Ricky stands beside her, making small-talk that feels pointless before it's even spoken. They eat dinner together at the kitchen table. They speak about college and jobs, more pointless topics that they can't seem to escape from. Simultaneously, everything feels new. Adrian wonders if maybe this could be a fresh start for them, but Ricky's not wondering that at all; he doesn't know why, but he has the feeling that it'll crash and burn even though it's barely even begun.

Ricky seems to be in a hurry to leave right after they finish eating. He says, "I should probably leave. Ben will be back soon, right?"

"He'll be back in the morning. He's visiting Leo."

He nods, searching her eyes because there's something there that he can't seem to detect. (But that's probably one of those things he lost the right to know about, too.) "It's getting late. I should get going." Adrian can feel him slipping away already. She seems to be having a difficult time comprehending that they're both leading different lives now.

Before going through the kitchen door, he turns to her because he feels compelled to do so, yet he already knows it's wrong, "I'll see you soon, then?"

She smiles softly, pursing her lips. "I'll see you soon, then." She walks him out the door and before he goes down the step she blurts quickly, "Tomorrow?"

He's already nodding: "Yeah, okay."

...

When he rings the doorbell the next day, mid-afternoon, the rain is pouring on the streets and the door felt scorchingly hot to touch when he brought his hand to it. Adrian's there again, swinging the door open, but she looks at him like she doesn't know what he's doing there. "Hi," Ricky says.

"You're actually here," she says. She's wearing a leather black dress and he thinks he remembers seeing her in something similar before.

"What?"

"I didn't think you were serious."

He nods slowly. "I was."

"Um, well come in," she tells him. "Ben's at work, but he'll be back in a couple of hours." He doesn't reply, not expecting an explanation about Ben every time.

They sit down on the couch, a few inches closer than yesterday. He opens his mouth to speak, but quickly forgets what he intended to say as a small three year old girl with shoulder-length brunette hair darts into the room. She stops several feet behind the couch when she realizes there's company, flashes them a smile.

"Hey, baby, why don't you go into your room so I can talk to my friend Ricky?" He can't help but notice how she uses it as if it's in the present tense when she says 'my friend Ricky.' Quietly, he's glowing.

She nods and quickly exits the room and Adrian turns back to Ricky. "Do you want a drink or something?"

"Sure."

Adrian comes back with champagne, pours two glasses and hands him one. "You drink now?" he asks.

"Not really. I mean, sometimes," she says. "Ben doesn't drink, and I don't in public or anything."

Silently, they drink, and as Ricky gazes blankly around the room at the black television screen and the stormy light that filters through the curtains on the window, he thinks he can see Adrian staring directly at him. And although he can't see it, he can feel the aura that she sends off from her stare: it's slightly nostalgic, slightly curious, and he finds himself meeting her eyes, trying to take her all in; trying to process Adrian two years ago and this older Adrian. (Later he discovers that maybe they're the same person, even now.)

She raises her glass and it all happens quickly then: she accidentally knocks the glass over, the champagne spilling all over their laps. "Shit, I'm sorry," she mutters quickly, standing.

"It's okay." He stands up with her, smiling slightly.

"Do you need a T-shirt or something? Maybe Ben has something—"

"No, it's fine. It'll dry. You didn't get that much on me, anyway."

She goes into her bedroom to change clothes, and Ricky goes down her hallway for the first time, going into the bathroom directly across from her room to dry his shirt. As soon as he kicks open the door, he catches sight of her in the mirror. She has the door halfway open in her bedroom, her bare back turned towards him.

For a minute, they share something where they're both staring at each other, as if they're both reminiscing to when they were together, to high school, to making love, to every part of it. But then she breaks eye contact and pulls her shirt on. He swallows timidly because he knows she's not his anymore, and then he grabs a towel from her cabinet and pretends that nothing just happened.

But they both know it was something.

And they both go back down the hallway pretending to be oblivious, sitting across from each other at the table in the living room instead. The words don't come easily then, and Ricky just thinks, _this isn't us. _They've never felt such an awkward silence with each other before, except after Adrian got pregnant with Ben, but even then it wasn't quite the same as it is now.

Ricky takes a drink with his elbows resting on the table, then he sighs. "What are we doing?"

"What do you mean?"

"I mean, I'm sitting here, talking to you, but neither of us is really saying anything."

Adrian says nothing at first, narrowing her eyes lightly. "What do you want me to say, Ricky?"

"Why didn't you call me?"

"I did," she says. "I called you when I was pregnant, and you never answered."

"I mean _after_," he says, raising his voice. "Why didn't you call me?"

"I didn't see the point," she retorts back. "_You _broke up with me. I didn't think you wanted to talk to me anymore, so that's what I did: eventually, I left you alone. I let you move on with your life. You were with Amy, and I was with Ben, how it's always been."

"It's not always been that way," he corrects her.

"You're right. For a while, it was one-sided. You wanted Amy, but you were with me." She pauses. "And I just wanted you."

"I didn't want Amy, alright? I thought I did, but I was wrong. She's a great mother to my kid, but that's all she'll be. And I even love Amy on some platonic level, but I cared about you, okay? I told you that."

She nods, wanting to say that nothing is platonic with him, but instead she brings the alcohol to her lips, not letting herself believe a word. "Well, it doesn't really matter anymore."

At a loss for words, Ricky surveys her slowly. "Do you love Ben?" His voice is deep and thick and serious and Adrian looks up from her glass and into his eyes, slightly surprised.

"Yes, I love Ben," she claims, almost offended.

"You're lying." He shakes his head. "Don't— don't marry him, alright?"

"You let me know when you can think of one reason why I shouldn't marry Ben."

"I can give you three right now," he snaps. "You shouldn't marry him just because you have a kid together. That doesn't mean you should be together. And—and Amy's not over Ben."

"And?"

She stares at him coldly yet expectantly, like she's trying to will him to say it, even though she knows he shouldn't. And when he does, it's quiet and broken: "I still care about you."

"_Ricky—_" she begins frantically and sighs because she can't complete that sentence. They feel like they're on a collision course. She says one thing, he says another, until they're reversing roles and don't even know what they want anymore. "You know, you broke up with me as soon as you found out Ben and I had sex. And I was heartbroken, but I felt disgusted with myself. You didn't speak to me, hardly even looked at me—"

"I was angry."

"I know. I was pretty angry at you when you kissed Amy, too."

"We've always cheated on each other, Adrian."

"Right. And when I found out I was pregnant, I wanted to take it back, you know? I wanted you to say you'd forgiven me and that kissing Amy was a mistake. But you didn't. And-and Ben was there. He was _always_ there-" her voice is cracking as she said this, tears forming in her eyes. "And he loved me. I didn't love him like I loved you, but I found that I can be happy with him."

She wipes her eye and starts to turn around, but before she can break eye contact Ricky wraps his arms around her, wanting to tell her that that kissing Amy is the worst betrayal he could have made to her, wanting to tell her so much but nothing seemed to come out. He runs his hands through her hair, kissing her forehead, trying to tell her in the best way he can. Maybe she knows, anyway.

"Ricky, I need to know," she whispers, trying to keep her voice steady. "Did you love me?"

He brings his lips to her forehead again and nods but doesn't kiss her. "Yes." _And maybe I still do._

They're not sure who initiates it or if it's mutual, but their lips meet, and it's like they're seventeen again. Ricky's hands travel to her torso, up the curve in her back, and to her shoulders. But it's short-lived; they pull away abruptly when they see headlights of a car, and within a minute they hear the door open and close. Adrian leaves Ricky there to wonder what just happened, and they're both denying that they would have gone further. (They're not thinking rationally, don't believe themselves, because maybe they would have.)

Adrian's arms are around Ben as soon as he tells her that his father died from heart failure this evening, and Ricky wants to say something, but he doesn't know what's going on and again he feels out of place. As he watches the two of them, slowly everything begins to sink in for him and he heads quietly toward the door, like he was never here at all. Adrian sees him over Ben's shoulder and briefly pulls away.

"I'm sorry. This was a mistake," Ricky says, thinking that he owes her some explanation. "Like I said, I shouldn't have come here."

"You don't have to leave."

He looks at Ben, having never seen him so broken before, and looks back to Adrian. "I do." (He doesn't want to.)

"I'll see you soon, then?" she whispers, tears in her eyes. And he simply stares at her, slowly inching over to the door. "Say it back. When I say it, you're supposed to say it back."

Every thing inside of him wants to say it back, just like everything inside of him wanted to continue kissing her earlier until they'd gone too far. But he knew they were too late, all they're doing is encircling now and it's too late for that. "Goodbye, Adrian."

…

They faded away just as quickly as they had been there with each other. They feel like that part of their lives with each other is over, leaving them to wonder if they were ever meant to be together at all.

Almost twelve months later, Ricky gets out of his car and walks down the street, and he catches her eye through the window eating alone at some restaurant. And then they both share a smirk, and it's as if nothing's changed. She's not his anymore, and he's not hers. But at that moment, they feel like one day it might happen again. That maybe, it's always been in their story for their lives to be tangled together.

* * *

**A/N: **So basically, you can interpret the ending however you want. Maybe they'll get back together, maybe they won't. Like I said I think this was probably extremely rushed, but I just had to get this down because I've had this idea for quite a while. I might even edit this eventually and re-publish it, but for now, plase review!


End file.
